to feel offended by mil comments of "let's hope he's not ginger"

[mustsleep]

so dh was on the phone to mil yesterday and being her usual sensitive self tried to talk him out of the home birth

then later went on to say that she hopes our new ds won;t be ginger - her exact words were i hope he doesnlt come out ginger!!

i have red hair
dd has strawberry blonde hair
dh has strawberry blonde
ds has dark brown

wtf has it got to do with her? i shouted well then she won;t want to be coming round to visit then as this would be such a dissapointment and i feel like i have enough to worry about at the moment being 38 weeks pregnant without stupid comments like this

dh thinks i am completely over reacting, but my ma has been delayed by 8 weeks, the cat has just been at the vets which has cost £300 and i am over my overdraft etc i just don;t need this as well

i said to dh that it;s remarkslike this that make people think that red hair is somehting to be ashamed of and if she is going to make derogatory remarks about it she would not be welcome - school is one thing but getting a complex about it before ten is another

she is well known for making sly comments that she "doenlt mean like that" like 4 hours after having dd she thought it best to inform me that i still had a fat tummy and everytime she would come round after that she would go on about it

aarrggghhh

sorry just felt like a rant

2 out of 3 of my kids are/were red haired. DS2 dyes his mad colours (currently purple) and DD (6) has copper coloured hair which is utterly beautiful.

I have never had any directly negative comments re the hair colour of my kids, although DS2 did get a bit of stick for it at school when he was around 11ish. It does, however, piss me off ENORMOUSLY when it is used as an general insult or as an undesirable physical trait. Very cheap and pathetic shot.

stretchmarkqueen your kis are lovely

now you see my hair is just slightly darker than your 6 year old dd's
and dd's is lighter than your youngest so has quite a bit of blonde in it

i think that mil thinks that she is being funny, but i was just seriously not in the mood for it

Mustsleep, Me and dh are fair. When dd was born I thought she was blonde and her hair was stained with blood.

After they washed her it was evident it wasn't blood - she infact is ginger. Not trusting my own judgement and confused as I thought she was blonde I comically asked dh "What colour is her hair?" He replied "Ginger."

When my MIL and her best friend came to visit me in hospital her best friend said "Don't worry about the hair colour. It will probably change."

"I hope it doesn't!" I replied "I think it is very pretty."

"Yes" My MIL added "but with that colour hair and ............. (the name we gave her) as a name she will probably get picked on at school!"

DD is now 2 and her hair is getting redder if anything and I have not once noticed anyone 'picking' on her yet only admiring her fun, pretty and cheeky looks!!!

Heres hoping you have a lovely little ginger present in 2 (or so) weeks time!

stretchmarkqueen. after seeing all the comments here i just had to go take a look.
and i couldn't find you, just your beautifull children.....till i noticed that that is YOU in teh bottom pic

you look far too young and pretty to have children.
tis not fair i tell ya

Lets get her!
I have red hair and love it! My ds has brown hair, but when the sun shines on it it looks red.. so it could change lol!
I felt a slight sadness when he was born with brown hair. I had a feeling it was going to be red.

(and that happens quite often with red hair!!)

Thanks for your lovely comments!

Mustsleep, my dp has dark brown hair, and one of my "friends" said to him, "Oh, what a shame she's ginger as well! Bet you're not happy!" ??

Don't worry there's safety in numbers, and I keep adding to the ginger population!! hahahaha

What beautiful stunning children you have stretchmarkqueen.

Just to say that I have a 3 year old daughter and she has red/auburn hair and its one of the two things people make posisitve comments about - as well as her big brown eyes.

Very sad lady to make this comment - like it makes a difference!

I know a woman whose DD married redhead, she was always making stupid 'I hope he's not ginger, I'll make her give him back' type 'remarks. The baby was born with red head and severe facial abnormalities. Made her seem quite shallow, especially as she kept on about his hair even after the birth.

I had red hair as a child (have gone darker now) and two of my dc had/have red hair. I hated being different and having comments made about my hair. Even the positive ones seemed laced with an underlying poison along the lines of thank-god-my-child-doesn't-look-like-that. Ds2 has now gone very dark while dd1 revels in her red hair but dyes it purple/burgundy etc.

And I hate the term ginger. I've never seen a piece of ginger that's the same colour as any red haired person. I might be moved to violence if the word ginger was used to me or my family. You have been warned!

my mum's a redhead and I hope we have a red-headed baby - I get really angry with people who say "oh no what if your baby's a ginger"....though normally they get embarassed when I say, why would that be awful?

wankers

Oh this really pisses me off! I am a redhead too. My "lovely" SIL said to me when I was expecting DD, that she didn't know what she would have done if one of her children had been born with red hair. I was so astounded that she was actually saying this outloud that I couldn't think of a retort for this ignorant, pathetic, stupid, social inept idiot (clearly, I have had time to think since then... )

This made me laugh if I'm honest. I've got one ginger girl and one dark blonde girl. Both are incredibly pale skinned and will most likely have loads of freckles as I'm covered in them. I do worry about having a ginger boy because come on...a very pale, freckly, gangly (if follows in dh's footsteps), ginger boy doesn't exactly scream "coolest kid in school" does it?

Holy cow. I would have said that I hoped that my DB did inherit the beautiful red family hair, but didn't inherit his grandmother's tact or sense.

Bloody cheek - i had the same sort of comments from my cow of a SIL before my DS was born as i have ginger ( and am proud to say the word!! ) hair..she did the whole 'let us know before hand and we'll bring in some bleach to the hospital so he doesn't have to go out in public like it' thing!!!! I love my hair colour and wouldn't have minded one bit if either of my dc's were born with red hair ( they weren't however as my DH has very dark hair and i think this drowned out the ginger gene!! ) Just ignore her and enjoy your beautiful new baby when he / she arrives

ginger haired children are beautiful

I have six ginger haired child relatives, all with piercing blue eyes and really white skin, they look like little wood sprites, gorgeous

You can't do anything with a MIL who feels the need to make remarks like this, other than a)smile dreamily and rise above it, b)patiently and in a non-combative way explain that these remakrs are hurtful and most people filter them out before they voice them, or c) decide that the campaign of drip-drip poison is bad enough to justify distancing yourselves from her.

Either way, don't let her spoil this for you!